Thursday, June 05, 2014

Rowan's Birth Story

Our little family of three grew to a family of four with the arrival of Rowan Claire on Tuesday, May 27th!

My doctor had scheduled an induction at my request. My parents live in South Dakota and my dad just happened to be visiting the southeast during the month of May in order to perform two weddings. He planned to come visit us the last week of May but had to leave to go back to work on Saturday, May 31 (my due date). I did not want him to be here for an entire week and miss meeting his granddaughter so I asked my doctor if she would consider doing an induction during that week.

She was happy to do it since I was induced with Blakely and had no problems. Once my induction date was set, my mom made her arrangements to come as well. She arrived on Sunday night and was able to spend Monday helping me get last minute things done.

Kevin, my mom, and me arrived at the hospital on Tuesday morning at 7:30. By 8:00, I was in my room and the doctor had broken my water. Being the wimp that I am, I asked for my epidural immediately. Also, I had been given an epidural before my first induction. So I had no idea what contractions felt like and I was more than happy to keep it that way.

The doctor told me that she liked patients to wait until they were at least 5 cm dilated and were feeling contractions before getting the epidural. So I had to endure a little pain in the meantime. The pain wasn't awful but I was more than happy to get that epidural about 5 hours later when the contractions were becoming more intense and coming closer together. At 1:00 pm, I received my epidural and then continued to wait until I got to 10 cm. While we waited, my mom, dad, Kevin, and his parents kept me company. I watched some TV, played some Candy Crush, and read the latest edition of People magazine. I definitely had a very positive laboring experience, especially with the pain relief.

At 4:45 pm the nurse checked me and I was fully dilated. However, this hospital likes for patients to wait to push until after the baby has had a chance to work its way down a little more because it cuts down on the amount of time that the mother has to push. With Blakely, I waited an hour before pushing. But with Rowan, the nurse said I probably only needed 20 minutes. I started feeling a little pressure and at 5:05, the nurse came back in the room to check me again. I told her I was feeling a weird pressure and when she looked, she said, "Oh no! We have to get the doctor immediately. There's a head." She told me that I was not to push at all until the doctor came in. As she was calling the doctor, Kevin was holding my leg and began yelling, "HEAD! HEAD!" By the time the doctor arrived about 2 minutes later, Rowan's head was almost completely out. She threw on her gloves and told me to give one tiny push. I pushed for about 10 seconds and out Rowan came!
She looked very similar to Blakely, but was quite a bit smaller. She weighed 7 lbs. 10 ounces and was 19 1/2 inches long.

The doctor immediately put her on my chest and I was able to hold her while they cleaned her. My mom and Kevin's mom were both in the delivery room when she was born so Kevin and I and the grandmothers were able to spend a good amount of time with her before the rest of the family came back to see her.

Once she was cleaned, Kevin went and got Blakely. She was so excited to see her baby sister. When she saw Rowan, she said, "Oh mommy! That's my baby Rowan. I want to hold her." We let her hold her for a little while and all Blakely wanted to do was give her hugs and kisses. It was really precious.

Overall, I had a wonderful labor and delivery experience and my recovery has been really easy so far. My mom will be here for two weeks total so that has been a huge help, especially with an almost 3 year old to chase around. It will certainly be an adjustment keeping up with two kids, but we feel so blessed to have these two wonderful daughters to raise!